That's Just Life
by Marygami12
Summary: Nico has to learn to live a normal life, directly following the Giant War. It may take a while, but with the support of friends new and old, he can finally be happy. (Don't worry friends, this is not a NicoxOC story, it is Percico, and yes, this summary does suck).
1. Chapter 1

Nico was just chilling alone in the Hades cabin at Camp Half-blood, the same way he had been doing whenever he could catch a break from Jason and Piper (and, up until a few days ago, Leo). The past three months following the Giant War had been slightly overwhelming for Nico. Reyna, Coach Hedge, and he somehow had managed to arrive at Half-blood hill just in time to stop an imminent attack from the Roman's, much to Octavian's chagrin. The Roman augur had still tried to rally the troops for an attack, but the sight of the Praetor and a giant gold and ivory statue calmed both sides enough to end the tension. The son of Hades remembered leaning heavily on Reyna and hearing the clatter of swords, shields, spears, bows, and arrows drop to the ground and a loud cheer rising from both sides at the sight of the three of them. Even the memory of hearing the cheers surprised Nico, even after three months he wasn't used to people _actually being happy to see him._ They were now though, people stopped flinching when he walked into a room and actually started to smile at him. People even started to walk up and talk to him, though it was only a few of the very brave campers, and after a time some of the campers started to realize that Nico was actually a very sweet person once they took the time to get to know him (though that number was still very small). The camp still found him intimidating, but the subtle changes showed that there was no animosity towards him. It made it incredibly easy for Jason to convince him to stay at camp (that and the fact that two heroes who shall remain unnamed moved to Camp Jupiter almost immediately).

A knock on his cabin door brought him out of his reverie. _It's probably Jason, I told him to go enjoy his date,_ Nico thought. Even if the campers weren't afraid of him anymore, only Jason, Hazel, Piper, and sometimes Leo were brave enough to approach the door of the obsidian stone cabin. "Jason, I told you I had stuff to do, go spend time with Piper. If it is absolutely necessary, you can come back late—" He stopped abruptly, the whole time he had been speaking, he had also been walking towards that door and had swung it open. "…Er" he finished weakly. It definitely wasn't Jason outside. "Percy." For a second, he just stands there, one hand still on the door handle, one hanging at his side.

"Uh, hi," Percy shuffled his feet, " I'm just stopping by to say hi…" he paused slightly and looked Nico over, "You look surprised, I take it Jason didn't tell you that I'm moving back to New York?"

Nico, still stuck in place, squeezed the door knob and stared blankly. "No, he didn't." He'd have a word with Jason later.

Percy rubbed the back of his neck with an amused smile, "So… Can I come in?" he asked.

That snapped Nico's attention and he stepped back with the door and gestured into his cabin with his free arm so Percy could walk right in front of him. Nico was already starting to feel awkward.

"You listen to The Downtown Fiction?" Nico had forgotten that his music was still playing on his Super-Special-Demigod laptop (Leo had named it, it was similar to Daedalus' laptop that Annabeth had, with a few add-ons from Leo) at a low volume on the desk next to his bed.

"Yeah, Thalia downloaded a bunch of these rock bands on my laptop when she came to visit last week. It was right before Leo left, actually." Coincidentally, Leo was the one who gave Nico the laptop after making it from scratch, along with the ones he gave to Jason and Piper. "She said something about making sure that I knew what good modern music, I kind of like them."

Percy nodded, slipping his hands into his pockets. It was a little unusual to be standing in the Hades cabin; he had never been in there before. He let his eyes wonder around and take in the room. For how foreboding the exterior was designed to be, the interior was quite cozy. The walls were paneled in a dark wood, and a large red and black striped rug was spread on the floor. It almost looked like a regular cabin one would find in the mountains or anywhere else one might build a cabin, though it was a bit darker from heavy curtains hanging in front of the windows and it was a little weird to see so many jewels sitting around (probably from Hazel). His wandering eyes finally landed on the resident of the cabin who was leaning against a dresser and fiddling in a drawer. Percy inspected Nico closely and was slightly surprised by how much _healthier_ Nico looked after only three months, "Did you get taller?" Percy stepped closer and realized that the height difference him and Nico used to have was roughly cut in half, and now the top of the younger boy's head reached the bottom of his chin.

Nico felt really uncomfortable with Percy there, and dammit he really shouldn't because it was his own cabin, but the awkwardness only grew at the older boy's closeness. He cleared his throat, "Yeah, I hit a growth spurt last month."

It was kind of impressive how well Nico was growing up, at least to Percy. He got taller, he was less scrawny and more lean (you could tell in the thin dark purple and gray striped sweater that he was wearing, along with the black skinny jeans and converse. Some things will never change.), and his skin was still pale, but it wasn't translucent anymore and looked more like polished ivory. Percy quickly realized he was staring. "Oh cool, well, I just wanted to come and say hi to you and check in with Chiron before I headed over to my mom's place. It was nice to see that you're doing well, hopefully we can hang out soon, maybe before Christmas?"

Nico just shrugged and Percy turned to walk towards the door. "Say hi to your mom from me," Nico called with a small smile as Percy turned to wave as he walked out the door. Nico sank back into his bed in relief after the door clicked shut. He would be giving Jason a stern talking to tomorrow morning. Only twenty minutes of breathing the same air as Percy Jackson and his mind was already a jumbled mess.


	2. Chapter 2

A/N: Just realized how to put this in here. This is the first fanfiction I have ever written, so I will always accept advice and crticism. This is chapter two, the story will be pretty slow build and I make no promises about updating (is anyone even reading this?) I hope you enjoy it. I don't have much to say right now, I'm still kinda setting up the scene. Go ahead and leave a review if you want.

The amount of force that was impacting Jason's shield was almost enough to crumple him to the ground, but he braced himself better and managed to keep his defense up. Nico was definitely upset right now.

"Why couldn't you just have told me that he was coming back?" Nico finally broke the verbal silence between them. Nearly dislocating Jason's arm was not as satisfying anymore.

Jason dropped his shield and rubbed his arm while panting, "Would you have ran if I did?" Jason didn't even need to ask, he knew exactly what he was talking about.

"No!" Jason just gave him a look. "Okay, maybe I would have conveniently made a visit to Camp Jupiter yesterday to make Christmas plans with Hazel for next month, but what does that matter? It would have been better than him showing up on my doorstep to try and make small talk, I had no idea what to do! I don't want to see them!"

"You don't have to see them—"

"He said he wants to hang out, there is no way I can avoid seeing them together if I stick around!" Nico finished his rant, and Jason just crossed his arms and waited a few seconds before responding.

"You done?" Jason asked and the younger boy nodded in reply. By then, Jason had learned that sometimes a little patience is all that's needed to deal with Nico. "Have you seen Annabeth around at all?"

That made Nico think for a second, "No I haven't, where _is_ Annabeth?"

"Maybe you should ask him yourself, he's coming over here with Piper."

Nico cursed quietly under his breath and turned to see the pair approach and greet them. He inspected Percy a little closer than he did yesterday while he was talking to Jason. There was something about Percy that Nico didn't notice yesterday, he seemed a lot more melancholy and solemn than he usually was, even after Tartarus. Jason tapped Nico gently with his elbow to get him to join the conversation and Nico shot him a glare before turning to Percy and speaking, "Umm, so, Percy, what brings you back to New York? Where's Annabeth?"

Percy looked away and seemed a little more uncomfortable than before, "She moved back in with her family in San Francisco… We split up…"

Nico paused in surprise before replying, "Oh… I'm sorry. Are you okay?"

Percy gave Nico a small smile, not as bright or happy as it used to be. "I'm fine. I hate having to cut this short, but I gotta go see Chiron. I'll see you guys soon."

Jason started pulling off his armor, "I'll go with you if you give me a minute; I'm done with getting my ass kicked by Nico. We can spar again some other time, sound good?"

Nico was about to insert a snarky reply, but was cut off by Piper, who up to this point had stayed out of the conversation. "If you're not tired Nico, you can give me the sword fighting lesson now instead of later?" The youngest of the group nodded and gave Piper a grin.

"Wait, you're getting sword fighting lessons from Nico?" Percy asked in slight surprise.

"It's 'cause I won't go easy on her—"

"And we're best buddies."

"Yeah of course we're best buddies. I like you way more than I like Jason even."

"Hey!" They all started laughing as Jason handed Piper his shield, "Don't kick his ass too hard, baby, wouldn't want to ruin his pride."

Nico lifted his hand, flapped it to imitate a mouth and mocked Jason's words in a higher pitched childish voice and blue a raspberry at Jason. That made Percy laugh loudly and he looked just as happy as he used to in that moment. Nico looked away to hide the grin and blush that was trying to push itself on his face from Percy's laugh.

Percy was really glad to see that the son of Hades was happy. Percy had almost forgotten what the boy looked like when happy. The over excited little boy was never coming back, and Nico was still really melancholy, but something about him was a little… brighter almost, at least when around Piper and Jason. Percy's smile faded a little as he felt a little like he missed out on something that he should've been there for, because the youngest of the demigods still seemed a little uncomfortable around the oldest of the demigods. Percy sighed inaudibly as he realized that while he was spacing out, Jason and Piper had left to the armory to swap armor leaving him alone with an awkward looking Nico. Percy tried to make small talk, "So, I heard that you guys were going to a school just inside the city," Nico nodded, "That's cool, I actually got my mom to enroll me into that school since I have to repeat my sophomore year anyway, and that school isn't that far from my mom's apartment. Maybe we'll have some classes together."

Nico gave a hesitant smile, "Maybe, I'm enrolled as freshman, so I don't think we will."

"Well I'll still see you around. I'm serious about hanging out. Oh, and my mom wanted to know if you had plans for Christmas dinner. She said if you don't that she wants to invite you."

Nico gave him a quizzical look, "I'll spend it with Hazel, she'll probably come over here and we'll hang out."

"Bring her too; my mom would love to meet her."

"Frank will probably come with her." Nico was now just grasping at straws now for an excuse to not come.

"Then he can come too, my mom won't take no for an answer." Percy grinned.

"I'll talk to them when I call her next," Nico responded weakly.

"Good, I'll be back in a few days, maybe we could spar. See if Jason's right about you kicking ass," Percy replied with a pat on his back before joining Jason who was halfway to the arena door and gesturing for him to come. "See you around."

Nico lifted his hand in farewell. Things just went from bad to worse in Nico's mind. Percy was single now, but the boy wouldn't let himself dwell on it. He turned as Piper jogged up to him. He is most definitely over Percy. He will not slip back into the measly little crush he once had on the gorgeous son of Poseidon. "Let's get started," Nico said with his sword ready.


End file.
